metadigital

... I don't think there are many (any?) people to offend. :D

Malek is just a cardboard-cutout, shallow, pantomime villain; a charicature of evil so easily identified as "the bad guy" for all the young members of the audience (and those in the cheap seats). Kreia represents a deeper, more complex character: the concept of bad (being "less than good") versus evil and the insidious qualities of negligence and the perversion of good intentions for self-interest. There just wasn't any backup to the concept; the nakedness was more suited to a plastic bad guy, like Malak.

... unless they have been married in a different country ... "

I guess I'm always chasing that feeling I got whilst watching ANH or even ESB (which I saw in Florida). Man those films really impacted on me. Since then, though, it's been a long line of disapointments. The new Doctor Who is a killer. I really take my hat off to Russell T. Davies, he has made a truly interesting story with characters I am interested in: even the dweeby guy from Corronation Street is treated in an aptly interesting way. :cool:

OOH can you do a Mira and Exile love scene behind the wall :D ? <{POST_SNAPBACK}> I don't see a wall, I see the obdurate personality of our familiar Zabrak. True art.

... and Assassins / Sentinels also get the "surprise attack" bonus when attacking stunned enemies.

Ahh, but there are inherrent contradictions in the dialogue, even between subsequent lines from the same character! Either killing the Force would end all life, or it would allow some life to remain without the pesky Force interfering. (Hence my crusade (<{POST_SNAPBACK}>)* to have Kreia consecrated as a Prophet. :cool: ). I liked the subtle "evil is not just the pantomime villain" theme of K2; I just wish it was explored to the same extent that the themes of K1 were explored. *Disclaimer: blatant self-aggrandizing plug neither implies nor warrants any good taste.

Is she playing with a ball of twine? :D

Just have all the robes look the same, then the hoods can all use the same base.

Yep, what I really was expecting from KotOR2 was the same as KotOR, just created on a much larger canvas. More worlds, more NPCs, more side quests. Meta is best, but technically I suppose you could abbreviate it to Meta'l! Edit: corrected spelling

I'd like it a lot more if GL stood back from his plot and let some other professional writers fill in the details, flesh out the characters, the dialogue, develop the leit-motifs and themes. Another bugbear I have with KotOR2 is the flawed philosophical exploration; it is not clear what the "big bad event we have to prevent" at the end of the story is; all we are told is that it has to be done, not what happens if we don't (will all life die, or just the Force). That's more a personal issue, I expect: not as many others are probably examining the ontological underpinnings of SW as keenly as me ... "

... or stringent typecasting. He needs to get another agent. :D

What's your favourite ending? Warren Spectre said that there was only going to be the one ending (can you guess what it is yet?), before they hit upon the brilliant idea of multiple endings. Oh, for all those nay-sayers that say it adds to much complexity for the sequel, Deus Ex:IW just assumed the one ending (although you have to play the entire sequel to discover which one it is...) Y'see, us geeks are a reasonable bunch.

*sigh* Is there no one else that wants a William Gibson inspired Sci-Fi based RPG? :cool: I swear if I have to kill one more blinking Orc with an Elvish Ranger ...

Well, I first saw A New Hope in Syndey in 1977, and it changed the world, and my world. It really was a seminal moment, so I count myself as a fan (though perhaps not a fanboy. So I tend to agree that the original concept is sound. (*strangled sarcastic comment about how you were so lucky to see only the first half of RotJ, rather than the second half*) I had ANH on video and watched it continually -- to the point of knowing all the dialogue -- during my teens. Roleplaying needn't incur the horrific experience you were soiled with (your growling encounter); I can sympathise as there are quite a lot of socially inept people using RP as a sort of de facto therapy to aclimatize into the real world, after a fashion. Which is why cRPG is so attractive: no need to have awkward social interactions with socially illiterate people, just interact in the immersive world created by the developers. Perfect! My complaint against KotOR is that it lacked sufficient depth to entice me to replay it multiple times. Specifically, the ending third of the narrative is the same, no matter what you do from the Dantooine confrontation onwards, no matter what your alignment and no matter what your choices generally throughout the game and specifically during said confrontation, which -- saddled with the bugs -- resulted in me uninstalling it; I am now playing Deus Ex and the sequel again. I would probably play KotOR before playing KotOR2 again.

Well, just because you don't learn from experience doesn't mean everyone else won't. I will not buy the next Star Wars RPG (I don't buy SW FPS as they suck) until after I have confirmed and re-confirmed the quality through the game magazines and fora, and then re-confirmed a third time by renting it. Very valid points about the predictable narrative elements, I expect this won't change as there seems to be a determination by LA and their harem of developers to pay endless homage to the limited archetypes provided by the films. I don't find it quite as unpalatable, however: it is SW, after all.

I want to play sci-fi RPGs, rather than Fantasy-based RPGs, but the brutal truth is that KotOR is very shallow and depends entirely on the SW franchise to survive. The game mechanics are far too limited (PCs are basically limited to Paladin/Blackguard classes) together with a single narrative resulting in a lack of depth and replayability. And then there is the ropey ending and buggy implementation.

Spoken like a truely devout ex-Soviet bloc country civilian It is still available from Activision: buy it! (Currently under $28)

Yes, unfortunately I bought and played HL2 to the bitter end. Note that I'm not attacking the setting, the atmosphere, or even the NPCs. Those were fine, better than in most FPSs I have played. I just don't see where the story on HL2 is. You spend the whole game running for your life (for unexplained reasons, too), except for the final part of the game. You don't have clear motivations for what you do other than "run, or the [insert nasty thing here] will shred you". That's not a story. That's map roaming. But perhaps I'm wrong and the game does have a story. If so, I totally missed it. Please be so kind to tell me what the hell it was about. <{POST_SNAPBACK}> Well, I don't expect to give you any insightful revelation ... The story was just that -- running for your life -- with the added twist whilst everyone expects you to have all the answers (until you get to a point where you can change the environment, rather than reacting to it). But this is a FPS, not a role playing game; mores the pity -- there doesn't need to be a huge premise to build a FPS upon, you just need to have reason to kill everyything that moves! It does strike me (maybe I'm alone here?) as pretty similar to most of K2, though -- certainly up until the Dantooine confrontation, at least. And remember that it isn't a RPG, half of the point of the game is in the multitude of different experiences and ways to extinguish virtual life (airboat, dune buggy, gravity gun). I would have liked to have another chapter after the end of the game (I didn't particularly like the end point being placed where it is), but then again it was best to place it there with a natural climax rather than just ending at an arbitrarily chosen point afterwards ... " Certainly there seemed to be a stronger narrative in the original. Perhpas the developers just assumed everyone has played the first game? Then again, "Aftermath" is about to be released, so I think the developers are gearing up to provide a sort of serial experience -- think Charles Dickens method of entertainment, where Steam equates to the mid-nineteenth century newspaper as a delivery mechanism.

Indeed the developers put this little bit in as a taste of the posibilities of the new engine. What they were amazed to find was how much role-playing was done by everyone in this tiny event, some people refused to pick up the litter, some ran away, some stoically took the beatings ... Unfortunately there aren't many more incidents like this (you can, however, interrogate your allies at various points throughout the game for more plot details throughout the game); you merely play out a specific (main protagonist) role in the narrative. If only they had some alternate paths through the game (rather than just the one), then they would have devised a cogent role playing game (albeit only a "good" path: no evil Gordons out there). Let's hope a new role-playing game built on the engine is coming soon... ^The ultimate sign you're a true internet geek. <{POST_SNAPBACK}> Or his girlfriend is. I thought I was far gone, at least my idea of a night out is still dinner and a movie. Now if I could just work my nerve up to talk to more girls that were...available. <{POST_SNAPBACK}> Or maybe she's playing Counter-Strike...

... maybe you only think the Exile decides her fate; maybe that's exactly what she wants you to think ...

The developers have said they regarded Ravenholm as the real beginning of the game; the antecedent is merely a prelude for the audience to familiarise themselves with the environment, tools and narrative. Father Grigori was certainly a great NPC. Gotta love that G-man, though: a new archetype for the modern age, the faceless, menacing beauracrat with unknown power and motivations -- I don't remember that from the classics ...

speciesism

Maybe they were using lunar days, or Mecurian siderial movements? ... unless they have sacked them all.